the more it's gone (the more it takes away)
by cyclothimic
Summary: A huge part of her was tempted to just leave National City to the wind and go around the globe. But deep down, she knew that if she abandoned the city, that would only piss Lena off more. l or Lena threw that bottle at Kara's head after the reveal.


**i think we all have the same thought when lena took that bottle out: she's deadass going to hurl that bottle at kara's face and be happy about it. **

**so, let's pretend she _did_ hurl that bottle at kara, and where it goes from there.**

**now, read, ponder, and enjoy!**

* * *

_What was it like to lose [her]? It was like hearing every goodbye ever said to me – said all at once._

_-Lang Leav, Lullabies_

* * *

"I didn't know what to bring so I bought red and white."

And even though Kara couldn't drink and rarely every drank, Alex had taught her quite a few things. Through the many kinds of wines she had tried, white had always won in Kara's books. So she was just about to just make a leap for it.

Except that Lena's smile dimmed in just a _second_. The wine went farther behind her head, and the woman didn't even hesitate as she _hurled _the bottle towards them – specifically, at Kara. Easily enough, Kara reached up to grab it before the bottle could smash right into her face and drench her in white wine.

She was about to do a victory dance before she realized what had happened. The rest of them were quiet, shocked and fearful and regretful, as they eyed between the CEO and the recently outed superheroine.

Kara jumped to her feet and whipped around to face Lena, who had that look on her face. That same look when Kara and Lena had only just known each other and Supergirl had to show up to her office to tell her the truth about Lillian Luthor and Cadmus. That look that was a mixture between disgust, disbelief, realization, and self-flagellation.

While the blonde was still trying to look for the right words without making it worse, Lena's eyes darted between the bottle and Kara multiple times. The situation couldn't get worse, Kara understood that; in fact, a huge part of her could see that this was the point of no return. And the last time she had felt this _desperate _and this much _love _was when Alex had walked out of the room to have J'onn perform the mindwipe procedure on her.

Lena looked to the rest of the room, at each of the people who had lied to her and betrayed her right to her face. Then her eyes met Kara's, and Kara had never seen so much loss in those pools of green before.

"Huh," she muttered.

If they couldn't see her, they'd have thought it was just a casual realization. No big deal. Just one 'huh' and she could move on. But they were looking right at her, and that tone was a complete contrast to the way that Lena was quietly breaking down, small and the opposite obvious, contained only within her eyes and the slow shuffle backwards and her hand reaching desperately for the door frame that she had just walked through.

At the sight that Lena was about to book it, Kara was struck into action. She rounded the armchair that she had been so cozy in just minutes ago and started approaching the CEO.

"Lena, wait. I can ex –"

"_Huh_." _That_ – that came out strangled. Empty. _Broken_.

And Lena booked it out of there before any of them could even get a word in.

* * *

If Kara was a more a patient person, she would have stayed clear for more than forty-eight hours. But she wasn't. She had never been, and she had never denied that. Impatience was one of her many vices – being stuck in an actual pod in empty space tended to do that to someone.

So she stayed up all night, exhausting the journalist in her to craft up the perfect speech that probably wouldn't thaw Lena entirely, but could maybe start the process. She stayed up all night, and let the desperation claw at her skin, her organs, and her bones – Rao only knew this pain couldn't compare to the kind that Lena was in. She stayed up all night, and she just hoped and hoped and hoped to a probably dying or already dead Rao to give her _one more thing_ – just one more, and she'd leave it alone. She stayed up all night, and she couldn't even fathom the idea of losing Lena without breaking into sobs.

The next morning, she picked up donuts and sticky buns and croissants and coffees from Noonan's, and made her way to L-Corp. She wasn't nervous, no – that was a phase that had come and go in a few seconds after she had realized what Lena hurling that bottle at her had meant. Right now, she was _utterly _terrified.

Walked in. Smiled as best as she could at Tom, the security guard. Went through the security scanning process. Took the elevator. Reached the top floor. Stopped short at the person who was decidedly _not _Jessica Huang sitting at Jess' desk.

"Who are you?" she asked.

The man smiled at her and introduced himself as Keith. Right, Keith.

The rest of his sentence went ignored as she immediately made for the doors, ignoring _Keith_'s protests and shouldering in, and stopped short again at the sight of the woman who was decidedly _not _Lena sitting on the couch.

Briefly, she wondered if Alex knew. Because Alex _should _know. Of all the people, Alex should be the first to know about this return after a year of absence.

"Sam," she said as her voice cracked along with that thing behind her ribcage.

Samantha Arias smiled apologetically and confusedly at her as she stood up from the couch. She must have said something to _Keith _for the man to leave her alone and get back out.

But Kara could only look at the couch – the couch that, apparently, was no longer occupied by the woman who built this empire from a very stenchful reputation. The couch that had served as a bridge for Kara to walk over to Lena. The couch that offered her the very opportunity to build a friendship with the _impossible _CEO outside of her identity as Supergirl. The couch that had seen so many and heard so much.

The _couch_.

"Hey, Kara."

The blonde blinked back into focus and saw that Sam had abandoned the couch to stand behind the bar, where she was pouring the two of them generous amounts of whiskey on the rocks. Kara stared at the decanter, and momentarily was brought back to last night when she had inadvertently confessed her cheating self by catching that white wine bottle.

Sam walked over to her and gestured towards the couch while handing over the glass of whiskey. Kara didn't even like whiskey. She drank it anyway.

"Lena called me last night. Just before midnight. She practically begged me to come back. Even offered to raise my salary by a large amount. She was…not in a good state of mind, but I couldn't get her to tell me why."

Kara blinked and frowned a little. "She didn't tell you."

"No. Said it wasn't her secret to tell."

Placing the empty glass on the coffee table, Kara bent over her waist to bury her face in her palms. Oh Rao.

"Can I ask what happened?"

Kara sucked in a sharp breath, deep and expanded her lungs to the fullest – it was a move that hurt, but it was a move that told her that this was real and not a long nightmare. She lifted her head from her hands and turned slightly to look at Sam through watery eyes, which caused the other woman to widen her eyes a little at the unexpected waterworks.

She wasn't certain as to what she should do with the information. Lena was rightfully angry at her, maybe even hated her to the core right now, but she still _did not _tell Sam about her – Sam, her best friend. That, weirdly enough, hurt more than the idea of Lena no longer being in National City, probably forever. _Rao_, Kara didn't even know where Lena was right now.

Once again, Lena had proven herself to be the best Luthor of the horde. Kind, intelligent, and unbearably thoughtful.

She stood up and shouldered her bag. The longer she remained in this office, the worse it would get. She couldn't sit here on this couch and drink from Lena's stock and not feel like everything was being torn apart. Alone. She needed to be alone.

"She threw a Chardonnay bottle at me."

On autopilot, she strode out of the office and barely threw the new secretary a glance. Looking at Keith would make it worse, for sure. When the elevator took too long, she went for the stairs. The stairs would take too long and she hated being in a cramped space, superspeed or not. Seconds later, National City would see Supergirl zooming out of the L-Corp building.

* * *

In all her life, there were five things that she could definitively affirm were the worst things to have ever happened to her: watching her home blowing up into smithereens with her parents on it, being stuck in the phantom zone for more than two decades, finding out that Astra was still alive and then losing her not long after, losing her powers for the first time, and talking to Alex for the first time after she had been mindwiped by J'onn.

And now, there were six.

It had been three weeks since Lena left National City and Sam Arias was back in charge – she was, namely, the CFO, but she pretty much ran everything around here. And from what Kara had overheard of the other Krytonian's conversation with her sister, Sam was pretty much running L-Corp as a whole, which told Kara enough about Lena's presence in her company and in their lives as of now.

Kara didn't chase after her. Trust her, she wanted to; a huge part of her was tempted to just leave National City to the wind and go around the globe, searching for that very heartbeat that she hadn't even realized was the oil that fueled her gears for quite a while. But deep down, she knew that if she did that – if she abandoned the city, that would only piss Lena off more.

So, she settled for this. This being that she remained as Supergirl to save puppies from clogged drains and mothers from being run over by buses. As Kara Danvers, the up and rising reported who pretty much swayed the citizens' support for Lex Luthor with one article. She settled for keeping National City as safe as possible as both Supergirl and Kara Danvers for when Lena finally returned and see that the city she had expended so much energy in saving was still that – _safe_.

_If _Lena finally returned.

* * *

Kara should have known better. She should have knocked. She should have kept an ear out at least. What she should not have done was to unlock the door and open it immediately without even so much as a warning, only to see Sam and Alex too absorbed in kissing each other on the couch to not even realize they had an intruder.

Like an absolute creep that she abhorred, she watched them. Unlike the absolute creep that she abhorred, she didn't find enjoyment in it; there were only envy and desolation. In her head, she was imagining another couch, another room, and two different people – one of them a liar, and the other a woman who had been hurt since the age of four.

Kara closed the door and leaned back against it as she breathed. When she finally got herself out of the building, she headed for the alien bar.

* * *

"Do – do you know what the…" Kara swallowed and failed to moisten her chapped throat, but she went on, "the sad thing is, though?" She squinted a little at the bartender, down at the empty tumbler, and tapped at the rim. "Top me up, please," she added.

The bartender, a nice Canopian dude called Jonathan, obliged, filled it up with the special brand of alcohol that would definitely affect Kryptonians – and she had only drank two tumblers of it. She made a drunken note to ask Alex to train her in drinking more. If she was going to be sad, she might as well go big with it.

Jonathan placed the refilled tumbler in front of her and leaned against the bar on the other side. "What is the saddest thing?" he prompted. It was a quiet Wednesday night, so it was no wonder that he would stand there and talk to her.

Kara placed her fingers over the rim of the tumbler and started spinning it in slow circles against the bar top, watching in her blurred vision the condensation gathering at the bottom of the tumbler, wetting it up. It wouldn't taste salty though, like the tears she had shed intermittently over the past month whenever she so much as thought about Lena.

She lifted her head to meet Jonathan's kind gaze. She hoped it was kind; she couldn't quite see properly. Wow. This alcohol was strong.

"The saddest thing is that I would have told her on that plane. I would have told her who I am on that plane, and I would have told her I love her." She had been so ready – to just blurt everything out and lay it all out in the open; let herself be flayed alive by Lena on that very plane. "But I was a coward. They call me _strong_ or _tough _or _determined_ –" she scoffed "– but I'm no more than a coward."

She tore her gaze away from Jonathan, downed the tumbler, and tapped the rim again.

* * *

And then it had been two months. Two long months, wherein Alex and Sam became increasingly happy together and Sam seemed to have become more of a permanent fixture who wouldn't be leaving anytime soon.

And Kara wasn't sure what to make of that, really.

On one hand, she loved Sam. She really did. Sam was a fun addition to their group – always the motherly figure who never ceased to take care of everyone else and that person who offered the weirdest joke at the most unexpected moments. Plus, Sam made Alex happy, and that, in Kara's books, made Sam awesome. On the other hand, however, Sam being here meant that Lena wasn't coming back. The longer Sam was here, the less hope Kara had in ever seeing Lena again.

"My, my, Kiera, even I didn't look this much like a hangover mouse when I won this award," Cat commented as she slithered up next to Kara, who had been hiding behind a pillar from all the noise and the applause and the slow progression of dinner.

Kara hummed impassionedly and shoved one more pot sticker into her mouth. They served pot stickers at this event – and for a moment, she had looked around, hoping to spot Lena in the room, because what kind of sane person would serve pot stickers at an honorable event like this?

One week after Lena's departure, Kara had come into the building to find Cat Grant back in her office, and James had been demoted back to his former office. She didn't even hesitate to stalk into the room, ignoring Nia's questions and another _new _assistant's protests, and stopped short of Cat's desk, wondering out loud at Cat's presence here.

Deep down, she had already known, the dread was already crawling up her veins and the temptation to tear out of the building was mounting. But she needed to hear it. Hear the words and affirm her deepest fear.

Cat had taken one look at her and gestured at her to sit down. Then in that calm and droll voice of hers, she explained everything to Kara in great detail, eying the reporter carefully, as if staring into her soul and trying to dig up the truth with her own words. She told Kara that Lena had emailed her a few days ago with a contract attached, demanding that Cat buy back the company with ten dollars. In that email, Lena had coolly explained that she was in no position to run a media company

"Please, chew faster. You're going to be up on stage in just a few minutes." Cat threw her a disdainful look before slithering away again, presumably backstage. And then, just as expected, she appeared _on stage _to stop behind the podium. "Well, well, a lot of fresh faces here, thank god for that," she began, eliciting snickers amongst the crowd.

The younger blonde swallowed the pot sticker, finding no bit of comfort on the yumminess of it when it was being severely clouded by nervousness. She returned to her seat at one of the tables and smiled shakily at Alex before returning her gaze to her mentor.

"What can I say about Kara Danvers?" Cat muttered, leaning against the podium with her fingers laced in front of the mic. "Well, she is unbearably kind, almost too patient, has a tendency to go off track in a conversation, and probably much too in love with pot stickers as a food." Kara smiled and ducked her head when more than few glances were thrown her way. "But since the first moment I met her, I knew that she was destined to be a reporter – a _journalist_. She has the drive, the passion, and is always seeking for justice, even when justice seems nowhere to be found – and the world needs someone like her. _National City _is certainly lucky to have her reporting the truth." Cat hummed and shot Kara a wink. "What I am surprised by, though, is that the stroke of inspiration for Kara to find her true calling was when Lena Luthor made a careless comment about _her_ being surprised by Kara not being a reporter back then."

Kara froze where she sat, and she could feel Alex's sympathizing eyes burning into the side of her head. But as she looked at Cat on stage, she could see that Cat did that on purpose – she said that on purpose.

_Well, you could have fooled me_.

"Because, as we know, Clark Kent, her cousin, was the one who wrote that very scathing article on Lex Luthor only so many years ago," Cat continued, pretending that she hadn't seen Kara practically vibrating in her seat.

_You have a natural gift with words. _

"But that is not the point. The point is, while we should always be thankful to Lena Luthor not only in her ventures in saving the world _multiple times_ –" Cat paused pointedly, seemingly making it her goal to stare everyone else down and dare them to refute her "– we should also be thankful to Lena Luthor for her role in bringing Kara Danvers out of her shell, and letting this very brave and very righteous reporter to shed light on issues that need to be brought to the attention of the public." Cat lifted the award that had been sitting on the podium and directed her gaze back to Kara with a genuinely proud smile. "Congratulations, Kara Danvers, on your first Ellie Award for National Interest. No one deserves it more than you."

Three weeks ago, when the email reached her inbox to inform her of this award, she was, for the first time in what felt like an eternity, reasonably delighted and excited. Kara was just an up and coming reporter, after all, and she was still on the receiving end of Snapper's spiteful corrections more often than not. Never in her life could she have thought of winning this award so soon, or any, actually – not even Clark had achieved the award winning stage of his reporting career.

The first person she had called was Alex, and her sister screamed on the phone with her – both of their screams so loud that Cat had to emerge from her cave to investigate the chaos.

It was when she and Alex finally hung up that the excitement died down in almost in an instance; the realization that the next person she wanted to call was so adamant to not see or talk to her that she literally sold off a company for one dollar and asked her CFO to take over the operations of L-Corp in National City washed over Kara like cold water. Kara had spent the whole day with her finger lingering on Lena's contact number, almost certain that the other woman had either deleted _her _contact information or changed her own number entirely.

Lena was always prone to the dramatics, after all – one of the things Kara adored about her.

In the end, Kara decided that Lena should be left alone. There was a reason that she had been off the radar for so long, and it was pretty obvious reason.

As Kara accepted the cordial congratulations on her way to the stage, her heart was sinking with the thought of looking out over the room and not seeing the very woman that Cat had credited to be the inspiration for her reporting career. As she accepted the award from Cat, she mustered a smile that she had mastered since the moment she landed on earth and realized that everything was different.

Kara opened her mouth, and did not tell anyone about how the article she had written to win this award was typed out in Lena Luthor's office, while Lena Luthor was in the White House, risking her life to save _her _home – because Lena Luthor was just that much of a martyr.

* * *

_Congratulations_, said the card that came with bouquet of plumerias delivered to her office the next day.

Kara sat in her chair, simultaneously numbed and exhilarated from the presence of the flowers. It was a singular bouquet, unlike the last time when her office had been flooded with flowers. But it was _something_.

* * *

She heard her heartbeat before anything else.

And Kara swung around from the roundtable where they had all gathered, including the heroes from Earth-One. There, just several yards before her, standing at the entrance of the emergency tent they had set up, was Lena Luthor.

Unlike Kara, the raven-haired woman looked refreshed, a little more mature than she had been, green eyes still as ethereal and piercing as the first time Kara looked into them. She looked prepared and geared up. She looked _close enough to touch_. Kara would have thought this was just an illusion from the exhaustion gathered in her body from the fights she had been through to protect this earth from complete annihilation, if it wasn't for the heartbeat that had increased slightly once they had locked eyes.

So afraid that if she moved, Lena would disappear into thin air, Kara only stood there, as Alex breathed the CEO's name in relief and Sam chuckled to herself. Their eyes were locked together since the moment she had spun around, and for the first time, she couldn't identify whatever was swirling in Lena's green eyes. That scared her.

"I was just finishing up a conference in London." Oh, so that was where she had been for six months. "And this guy just…conjured up in my office." Lena started approaching them, gaze still engaged with Kara. "He calls himself the Monitor."

At the name, Kara straightened and frowned deeply, trying to understand what Lena was trying to tell them.

"He told me to return to National City immediately, because my friends need me." A bitter chuckle at that, and their eye contact was broken and Lena eyed the room. "I was so tempted to tell him that I don't have friends."

Following the statement was an echo of flinches and murmured apologies, but Lena waved it away dismissively with a shrug.

"Then he told me that I am supposed to be pivotal in the rescue of time and the _multiverse_," Lena hissed, returning her fiery gaze at Kara, accusatory and disbelieving. "The scientist in me was _very _intrigued, but it wasn't enough, of course. I've kind of grown tired of saving one earth – it's a thankless job – much less _multiple_."

"So what brought you here?" Cisco daringly asked, because he didn't know her – he didn't know them.

But the rest of them – the so-called Super-friends – like it or not, knew Lena, despite her absence of six months. One look at her and the way she was staring at Kara, the struggle in the tremble of her chin, the fidgets of her hands like she had done so long ago after she had tossed that bottle at Kara's hand – one look at Lena and they all knew why she was here.

Lena clenched her jaw and shook her head, moving to stand next to Kara though deliberately making sure that they didn't touch. Even then, the heat was definitely – the warmth that Kara had tried and failed to forget over the last six months. It was there and so _offensive _in its presence, aggression galore as it attacked Kara's senses from every direction, _daring _Kara to do the one thing she had wanted to do since she realized she was head over heels in love with the woman beside her.

Still, the blonde's gaze followed Lena, just as always. It was a natural body reaction. Lena was the North to Kara's South on the magnetized spectrum, and it would be wasted effort to even try to resist the pull. Kara followed; Kara looked; Kara relished in the absolute beauty that was Lena Luthor, inside and out; Kara hoped.

"I guess we'll never know." She licked her lips and cleared her throat. "So can anyone tell me who this Monitor is? And how I'm supposed to be pivotal in this whole crisis?"

* * *

A roughly fleshed out and mostly chaotic battle plan was strategized and put on the board, with the hopes that everyone would follow with no hiccups. But judging from experience over the past three multiverse crisis that they had been involved in, Kara would be hard pressed to even think about _anything _going according to plan.

After the discussion in which Oliver and Lena almost went at it right there _on _the table, Lena and Kara had silently agreed to head up to the roof together. They sat on the edge of the roof, their legs dangling over.

Kara was on high alert mode for _any _moment where Lena could risk falling over – she had just gotten the woman back; she wasn't going to lose her to a fault of gravity. If she had any choice at all, they would be in the middle, where there was concrete around them and no chance of toppling over. But Lena hadn't even questioned it when she headed over to the edge and just sat right down.

There were so many things Kara wanted to tell Lena. _I love you. I'm sorry. I love you. I missed you. I love you._

"I'm going to die, isn't it?"

Lena inhaled sharply and shot Kara a sharp look before returning her gaze to the sunset over the city. "Not if I can help it."

"Thank you for coming back."

"I seem to be addicted to it."

"To what?"

The CEO clenched her jaw and _refused _to look at Kara at all. "Saving you," she finally choked out.

Kara stilled. She couldn't do anything but keep her eyes locked onto Lena's side profile, wondering what the heck was going on in that big brain of hers and if grabbing her and flying her off to Argo would be wise.

"You – you lied to me for years. You manipulated me. You _toyed _with my trust. I fucking _left _the city." Lena breathed deeply as her body shook from the emotions staining her words. "And yet I _still _can't quit you. Why is that?" she demanded as she finally turned to look at Kara with raging green eyes.

Kara opened her mouth, and realized she didn't know exactly how she should respond to that. So she settled with a half-hearted shrug and wry twist to her lips. "Beats me. I can't quit you too."

That was, apparently, the wrong thing to say, because Lena stiffed considerably – she would have been statue if it wasn't for the way her heart stuttered and her breath stammered. And then the raven-haired woman scrambled to her feet and started back towards the middle of the roof, which gave Kara marginal relief – at least she didn't have to worry about Lena becoming public brain matter before Kara could an eyeful of her.

Lena was shaking her head and wagging her finger at the blonde, tears starting to stream down her face with no relief. "No, you _don't _get to do that. How _dare _you. I –"

"Lena, I'm sorry."

"– spent six months trying to forget you. I was so angry at you. I felt so fucking betrayed. It was –"

"I didn't know how to tell you."

"– awful! Do you know how awful it is? To not have your best friend by your side? The one person who knows you for who you truly are? Do you have _any _idea –"

"Yes, I do! Every second you were not here, I felt it. I felt so –"

"– _lonely _it's like? _Fuck_, I was so in love with you. And I still am, for fuck's sake. Because I'm not a genius, apparently. I'm an idiot. I'm an idiot who comes running back when she hears some bald dude with the weirdest facial hair ever and a stupid armor telling her that the woman she _loves _is going to die if she doesn't come back. I'm _that _pathetic idiot. I –"

The rest of Lena's words were swallowed up when Kara swooped forward in superspeed, gathered the woman up in her arms, and pressed their lips together. It was rushed and sudden and unbalanced. But for a moment, just for that singular cycle of the hands on the clock and the birds going to rest and the traffic clogging up for post working hours, Kara didn't remember the Monitor or Oliver's fate or fucking quantum entanglement.

It was the most unfair thing that Kara had ever experienced. She was about to die, and she was addicted to this. The sweet tang of Lena's lips and the gentle pillows pressed against her skin and the perfection that fit into her arms so easily.

She pulled back a little but didn't let Lena out of her grasp, leaning their foreheads together. She took a deep breath and said the only things she could say at this point, "I'm sorry. I missed you. I love you."

Lena gasped. They were so close. Kara could kiss her. Wanted to kiss her. Just one lean forward and she could forget about the world again. She restrained herself and waited for Lena to make her move.

Lena then sighed and circled her arms around Kara's neck. "I'm that idiot who's _always _down to save the world _with you_."

Kara didn't get to finish her teary chuckle as Lena pulled her down for another kiss – a steadier, more stable, but still addictive kiss. She didn't know if she was going to die in this crisis; she really hoped not, because two of this really weren't enough.

But if she was going to die having _felt _this absolute wonderment that belonged only to her – Kara tightened her arms around Lena and allowed a zing of pride when Lena released a small moan as she bit down on the woman's lower lip – then Kara vowed to Rao and beyond that she would _always _find Lena Luthor – no matter who they were and who they would become.

The world could take away whatever they wanted from her, but Kara would die one thousand times and more before she let them take away Lena. _Always_.

* * *

**y'all, i don't care what y'all think, but that last episode was *chef's kiss*. the angst was perfect. my heart was ripped out, put back in, fixed up, and then ripped apart again. truly an experience. i can't wait to go through that for more than twenty episodes next season. it's going to be epic. **


End file.
